When Numbers Get In The Way of Living

Part One

Why do the numbers matter?  To everyone else, the numbers are a measure of how well 'you' are managing your diabetes, how many highs, how many lows, your A1c!  There - that was pretty much the entirety of a twice yearly consultation with the 'specialist'.

And there is the rub, 'cos they are a specialist - in endocrinology - not in managing diabetes, not in living with diabetes and most certainly not in coping with diabetes.

So there you are, with an A1c that's half a percent up on last time, you feel like a failure - after all, you work so hard at 'managing'.  You take pride in how hard you work to manage your health and this result leaves you devastated, feeling defeated.  Why?

Why do you allow a number to control your life, the numbers are a measure of your condition, not a measure of your life!  Tight control is laudable, aspirational even.  It isn't sustainable if the effect of the numbers mean you lose quality of life. If you're stressed, worried, feeling like any comment is a criticism!  Feeling like you've let yourself down.

So do the numbers matter?  Yes, but not as the be all and end all, and certainly not as a measure of who you are!

Easy this diabetes, isn't it?

Worried - Hell Yes!

Last night was an eye opener.  Ok, so I'm only 7 months old in diabetes years, but I also a grown man, so you'd think I would be able to avoid a self-inflicted scare, right?

Ha, if only.  So there I was, meal cooked, hands clean (please note DSN!), bg measured carbs counted and bolus injected - all ready to eat and chatting away with Mrs. B when 'we' decided to take a closer look at a logo we have been designing. "It'll only take me a few minutes" said Mrs. B, "I'll just pop up and edit it, it'll look so much better!"

No worries.  I sat there and faffed with the website a bit, then decided to check the links, then updated a blog, then faffed a bit more, then went to synch the sites so I could see how it looked 'live' - boom - an hour had passed and all of a sudden I couldn't see properly.  Ringing in the ears, heart beat up...whoa there.

Stood up and walked out of the office, feeling ever so slightly like it wasn't really me, like I was only a passenger on a bus along for the ride, and not really worried about who the hell WAS driving the bus!

Walked into the kitchen, opened the fridge!  Went to the table, picked up my meter and my plate of food. Walked into the lounge - sat down, started at the food in one hand and the meter in the other.

"Are you OK" asked Mrs. B

"I think I might be a bit low", says I. "I took the bolus ages ago." Doh!  Still hasn't registered that I might actually need to eat something, like, fast!

So what do I do?  Another bg test!  What a plonker - bg of 2.6, my first ever below 3 reading and I still sat there like a lemon!  Mrs. B to the rescue, one big glass of orange juice later and an 'instruction' to eat my food and an hour later I was back up to a 4.3.  

Then a 6.8.

Then a 9.8 before bed!! And now scared to correct 'cos its bedtime and worried about going low overnight!

Quote of the night from the wonderful Mrs. B "wow, like you can't lose focus on this even once can you. I mean ever!"

Pah - easy this diabetes, isn't it?

Neighbours - Series 1, Episode 1

A tale of the breakdown in the relationship between Hilary Pancreas and Peter Beta-Cell. Set in the small town of Pancreville.

Episode One

"Well, we'd been together for years"  said Mrs P, "I thought we knew each other so well, I mean, we practically grew up together (sniff, sniff).

Years, I mean literally, years! Living together,  working together, building a beautiful home together - great views by the way and lovely weather on the Islets of Langerhan - and at least I get to keep the house!

And now he's just gone!  Up'd and left me - I bet its that Suzy Amylin, I bet they've run off together, 'cos she's mysteriously disappeared too - cow!  

We even went to councelling, the therapist suggested a 2nd honeymoon might rekindle the enthusiasm, I was willing to try anything, said Mrs P.

We packed our bags, and off we went.  It was like magic! Ohh what memories, the first few weeks turned into a couple of great months, just like the old days, he couldn't keep away from me! 

Then he just seemed to fade out.  

Like he wasn't even really there (sniff, sniff). I tried everything (sobs)

I made his favourite meals, did all the things he likes to do, went to the macth with him, everything! But it made no difference. Slowley, week by week, he just closed down on me, withdrew, physically and emotionally.  It was like being in the house all alone with only the echo of him there....(sobs uncontrollably)....what am I going to do...(wail!)

"Think of the children - all those little mouths to feed, all the time, every day!!  You can't leave me to do this on my own" she cried "Every cell of my body yearns for him - how will I cope!!"

Thank you so much for listening, and the hanky (!), sorry about the tears but I just don't know what to do....what did you say your name was?

Well my dear, let me formally introduce my self - the name is Ian Sulin, perhaps I can help?  Dinner?

Next Episode: Is it on or off?  The Highs & Lows of a new drama about relationships.

This is My Meter - T1D Creed!

This is My Meter

Hooooo Raaah!, Semper Fi.

This is my meter. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

My meter is my best friend. 

It is my life. 

I must master it as I must master my life.

My meter, without me, is useless. 

Without my meter, I am useless. 

I must use my meter true. 

I must test to stop my enemy, diabetes, who is trying to kill me. 

My meter and myself know that what counts in this war is not the tests we do, the results, or the insulin we take. We know that it is the attitude that counts. 

My meter is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its strips and its lancet. I will keep my meter clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. 

Before my DSN, I swear this creed. 

My meter and myself are the defenders of my body. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.

So be it, until victory is ours and there is no diabetes, but a fully working pancreas for all!

Hooooo Raaah!

Carb Counting Made Simple

Carb Counting Made Simple

Your body needs energy - Calories (or Kcal) - in order to work.

If you can eat it!!

It can pretty much turn anything you stick in your mouth into energy.  The UK Department of Health Estimated Average Requirements (EAR) are a daily calorie intake of 1940 calories per day for woman and 2550 for men.

There is a fiendish calculation that works out for your height, weight and activity level what your personal total should be, but we'll go with the average for now.

All of those scrummy calories come from whatever we eat or drink.  Different types of food yield different amounts of calories, for example:

• Fats - 9 Kcal/g
• Carbs - 4 Kcal/g
• Protein - 4 Kcal/g
• Alcohol - 7 Kcal/g

Ranked in order of how quickly your body can use that energy?

1. Alcohol*
2. Carbs
3. Protein
4. Fats

* 'cos whilst your body is processing alcohol it can't process anything else!

So if you have a nice cold beer and meal of say, steak & chips with a creamy pepper sauce and vegetables followed by a delicious new york cheese cake (mmmmm)  you would have a combination of fats, protein, carbohydrates and alcohol.

Now your body tries to convert everything you eat or drink into energy, glucose. Some stuff is too hard, even for you! Fibre is tough for the body to breakdown, raw starchy foods are hard work and most raw veg is quite a lot of work too. Carbs are easy peasy.

The body *loves* carbohydrates in all their delicious and addictive forms.  Carbs are easy to digest and turn almost instantly into glucose.  So fast is the process that before you have even swallowed your first bite of that sponge cake the enzymes in your mouth are breaking it down into glucose!

What happens next I hear you cry!  Well, sit back and let me explain.

Assuming you are not doing any exercise, as you digest your food and turn it into glucose you naturally experience an increase in the amount of glucose in the blood stream.  The increase in glucose levels, in non-diabetics, causes the pancreas to start delivering insulin to the body.

The body can do three things with the glucose:

1. It can use it to provide fuel to the cells of the body.  Every cell in the body needs glucose to live and function.

2. It can 'charge up' the liver, where is is stored as glycogen (think concentrated glucose)

3. It can be turned into fat

To get the glucose into every cell of the body, with the exception of the brain and autonomic system (think nerves/heart/spine) which can satisfy their needs directly from the blood stream, the cells need insulin.

Insulin 'unlocks' the cell door.  It transports glucose into the cell.  

No insulin, no energy in the cell.

So for you, you pancreatically challenged fool, if you don't inject insulin, you have no mechanism for transporting fuel to the cells in your body.

"But how much insulin do I need to inject", now the fun starts.  Remember I told you to test?  Remember I told you to log data?  Well this is why.  You are as strange and unique as the next diabetic, and your body will behave in its own beautifully independent fashion.  It will not conform to averages, 'normal' ratios or even guesswork!

You will need to learn!  

You will then need to learn to think like your pancreas. If you *really* want to control your diabetes you will need to grab a hold of it and make it a part of you, accept it, internalise it and get on with living with it - not have it control you!

Keep a paper diary, log everything - time you ate, what you ate, how many grams of carbs (its on the label!!), what was your bg before you ate, was it a meal out, were you socialising, what sort of mood were you in? 

Always check you bg 1.5hrs after eating, 'cos 50% of your bolus will have been used up by then so you should have peaked on you bg post meal and you can check to see if you got it right.

Only with your data can you make informed decisions.

Keep capturing the data and believe me you will soon spot patterns.

Next edition:  Why Low Carb - are you mad?

Testing Times!!

Testing Times!

Why oh Why - someone please tell me why I have to spear myself all the bloody time (& I do mean bloody!).

Simple.

Your BG Meter is the only tool you have to help you make informed choices about managing your diabetes.  Don't want to manage it?  Want to be one of these statistics?

• Kidney disease accounts for 21 per cent of deaths in Type 1 diabetes
• Cardiovascular disease is a major cause of death and disability in people with diabetes, accounting for 44 per cent of fatalities in people with Type 1 diabetes
• People with diabetes are 10 to 20 times more likely to go blind than people without.
• Diabetes is the most common cause of lower limb amputations.  Up to 70 per cent of people die within five years of having an amputation as a result of diabetes.
• Neuropathies (or nerve damage) may affect up to 50 per cent of patients with diabetes.
• Diabetes is the fifth most common cause of death in the world    
• The prevalence of depression is approximately twice as high in people with diabetes as it is in the general population

Source: www.diabetes.org.uk/Documents/Reports/Diabetes_in_the_UK_2010.pdf

Life expectancy is reduced, on average, by more than 20 years in people with Type 1 diabetes

Well I sure as hell don't, so given the choice, and it is MY choice, I want to manage my diabetes!

Easier said than done.....

Here is my first ever chart - the last week of January, my first few insulin injections and the first time I got the meter to say anything other than "HI"!

Max, Min and Average

I was very pleased with this.  Scared, worried that, as the GP had said "It'll take you eighteen months to get your bloods under control, and we don't recommend you do anything more strenuous than a gentle walk maybe once a day", but heartened that it was at least possible to get this thing under control.

One week of data, loads of reading, and no way I was going to have my life expectancy reduced by 20 years!  FFS that would only give me another ten to fifteen years.  Sod that.  Way too much to do yet!

I could barely wait for each new day and each new hour so I could capture more data, test, test, test.  I was racking up at least ten tests a day.  I knew that the more data I had the better chance I would have of being able to make sensible and informed decisions.

By now I had also decided to go  low carb.  I mean really low carb.  I was not my Dieticians favourite pupil any more.

Next edition:  Carb counting, Energy, Pseudoscience and Guidelines!

Reading Material

Reading Material!

Type 1 Diabetes then?  Wow.  At 44 years old?  Are they absolutely sure?

Having now met the Consultant and spent another two hours going through things in even more detail I was told that 

"Almost certainly you are a Type 1 Diabetic" 

There were other concerns with symptoms, which might be down to any number of things; coeliac, hyperthyroidism, cancer, fatty liver decease (?), aching kidneys, all of which could be due to high blood sugar levels over the last couple of months but still needed to be explained.  Doc explained that he thought my background level of fitness and consumption of gallons of water was one of the reasons I hadn't fallen over yet!!

Good job I love to read, study and learn new things.

Imagine my delight at dipping into the world of diabetes!  Brilliant.  No two 'specialists' can agree on anything.  If one says it's Black, the other says it's White, and both show 'studies' to prove the point. If the UK says its mmol/l the USA says its mg/dl - you work it out!

Have I mentioned Specialist Diabetic Dieticians yet?  

Wow, another whole world of psudo-science and government guidelines!  about the only thing that the Endocrinologists and the Dieticians seem to agree on is that the body needs energy! As if that wasn't enough to be getting my head around, along comes Carbohydrate Counting (Carb Counting), the joy!!

Fortunately I was pointed in the direction of  a few 'must read' books, each of which I will review individually in separate articles:

The Diabetes Solution by Dr Richard K. Berstein, MD was my first read.  Cover to cover, two day, job done.  So now I'm an expert eh? But hold on, everything he says is in direct opposition to the American Diabetic Association? Duh? Why?

POLITICS

Oh for the love of sweets!  Is there nowhere safe from the vested interests of capitalism?  Money + power = politics.  There, I've said it...now I'll have to explain it.  I promise to devote time to write a piece on just this, explaining what I have read, heard, found and observed over the last six months!

Back to reading lists.  So having read about the fight between Bernstein and 'the Establishment' I thought I had better read something from them too. 

American Diabetes Association (ADA) and the Medical Management of Type 1 Diabetes, fifth edition was my second read. Very useful, written for the medical community and surprisingly easy to follow, although I did have to keep the medical dictionary & google close to hand!

Next was Think Like a Pancreas by Gary Scheiner.  Bloody Brilliant, I'll say it again, brilliant!

Type 1 Diabetes for Dummies is exactly what it says it is.  Very 'on message' with the ADA.

Carbs & Cals by Chello Publishing Ltd who also have an iPhone app to go with it - very, very handy for carb counting beginners and experts alike.

Dr. Robert Atkins and Dr Atkins New Diet Revolution

The Glycemic Index for Dummies

Sheri R. Colberg and the Diabetic Athelete's Handbook

and several hundred research papers from institutes all over the world studying diet, exercise, insulin, complications (eek) and everything else affected by diabetes, which I will also share with you over the coming posts.

So what have I immediately learnt form reading all of the above?

One key thing:  I can manage my diabetes

Next edition:  Testing Times!

Someone Cares

Someone cares

Thursday 26th January 2012

The day it all began to go right again!

First though, remember my GP telling me that they had arranged an appointment with a specialist? So here I am, checked in at reception at the community hospital, sitting waiting my turn and soon enough I'm led though and introduced to?  A consultant endocrinologist? No.  A bloody nurse!

Fair enough, very nice lady, introduces herself as a Nurse Consultant (?), all I hear is 'nurse'.

Soddit.  Deep breath, calm, hold back the black thoughts of "just wait 'til I see the sodding GP".  Here we go again I thought, having to explain it all to someone who won't be able to do a damn thing about it, don't they get just how shitty I'm feeling?

As it turns out I was meeting with an angel.

Not only did she "get it", she asked incredibly good questions, dug into every aspect of the symptoms, checked and rechecked details, and with hindsight, I'm pretty sure she could have wrapped the consult up in about 30 min, but she let me talk and allayed my concerns for about two hours.

I finally felt as if someone was not only listening, but actually knew what my symptoms meant.  Knew what to do about it.  Could offer a solution!!

"Great" said I, "so do you now have to make an appointment for me with a consultant?" - thinking that, nice as this has been, I really need treatment of some sort and that means a consultant, right?

So she repeated, "I'n a Nurse Consultant specialising in Diabetes, I can write out the prescriptions for you right now"

Two hours later and I had all the supplies I needed to get started on injecting insulin!!

Next episode:  Graphs, Charts, Data - Why?

NHS Direct - bless !!

NHS Direct - bless!

Right then, cut our sugar eh?  

Easy peasy.  Delicious supper of vegetable chillie and rice. Loads of lentils, five different kinds of beans, basmati rice - delicious!!

I love to cook, and as we grow most of our own veg we tend to eat relatively healthily (hides the crisps & chocolate behind the fresh fruit!).

It must be noted at this point that at no time did the GP show any interest in my description of the "loose stools" that I had been suffering from for the last four weeks.  No questioning about the debilitating and constant headache, no perked interest in my description of blurry vision coming on over the last six weeks or so, and no surprise at the sudden loss of weight. They must be all meaningless then, eh?

Dinner was delicious.  I forgot to test before dinner, but did take a metformin tablet as the GP had told me I would need to take them twice a day for the rest of my life.  Settled back on the sofa, watching telly, feeling really crap.  Mrs B says, why don't you do one of those tests?  Great - why didn't I think of that?

Test kit out, check strips, stab self with lancet (ouch!), too bloody right I don't want to do that often, it hurts! Drop of blood on strip, *BEEP* - "HI".

Wow, thats nice, it's saying Hi....very cool and a good sense of humour these meter companies.

Wait, wait, wait....hang on....must have done something wrong.  New strip, another stab (dammit!), another drop of blood and.....

"HI"

???

Where's the sodding manual, did I chuck it with the box?

Ooops, manual says that HI means over 33.3 mmol/l - crap!!

What to do - is it serious?  What does Professor Google say?  Holy Candy Floss Batman, this isn't looking good!  Now the GP had said to call them if it went above 20, its 10:30 at night, should I call?  Yes!

Ring, ring, - out of office hours message tells me to ring NHS Direct, so I guess I'll do that then.

Ring, ring, NHS Direct, how can I help you?

Utterly charming, very calming.  No explanation of what a BG of over 33.3 was, no advice on what to do, no idea other than "speak to you GP in the morning"

Back to trusty old #doc & Professor Google

Some of the best advice and most reassuring help I have ever had.  The #doc helped a very scared, worried and frightened person cope with a 10 hour wait for the GPs office to open.

Before bed test was still HI.

Next morning it was 19.6

Ring, ring...ring, ring,  "Hello, can I speak to the doctor please"

I described the test results, said I was very worried, was told that they now thought they could get me an appointment with a specialist within a week!  Why I asked, what's changed?  Why the sudden rush?  No real answer to that other than that it was me, the patient, who wanted to see a specialist and they were only trying to facilitate that.

What about the bg test results?  "Well they are coming down, so just keep an eye on them."

That afternoon I had my second call from the GP.  They had managed to get me an cancellation appointment with a specialist for the following day. Could I come into the surgery and pick up the referral letter to take with me to the specialist?

Have I mentioned the darkness of my mood and my mega sense of humour failure?  Imagine a very grouchy, very tetchy, very moody, irascible and above all tired, physically and mentally knackered, man.  Got it?  

Well that doesn't even begin to describe how bad I felt.

Tomorrow's appointment with the specialist couldn't come quickly enough.

Next instalment: Someone cares!

One Week In.....

I week in....

"But Paul" I hear you ask, "What happened in the 10 days between the General Practitioner (GP) telling you your fasting blood glucose (BG) was 17.6mmol/l and you being put on insulin?"

A very good question, and here's the tale:

I generally liked to think of myself as pretty fit.  Lots of walking with three dogs twice a day, running, cycling and the ever needy garden to tend to.

Sure I love my food and was perhaps a bit overweight, perhaps I drank a bit too much now and then, but I could also run an 8:30 mile, do hiking all day and cycle for hours without being knackered at the end of it.

In the twelve years or so that we have lived here I think I have been to the GP's maybe three or four times, usual stuff, man-flu (!), stomach bug, you know the sort of thing.  On each visit I have met a different GP, some I think were full-timers, others just passing through, suffice to say I had never met the same person twice.

So on Monday the 16th January when  I went into the surgery it was no surprise to me that I was seen by a temp GP.  She was lovely. I was asked for a urine sample and as soon as it showed positive for glucose I was asked to book in for a fasting blood test.  Fasting?  What's that I asked, and so the use of the word "diabetes" was introduced to my lexicon for the first time.

Having made a booking for the first slot available that Friday I was sent on my way.

Friday the 20th 09:30.  Fasting Blood Test, and cholesterol, liver function, kidney function oooh intriguing!

A Pint of Blood! That's nearly an armful!

Friday the 20th 16:30 - call at home from the GP's!  Some doctor I've never heard of, who apparently is the head of the practise. "Hello" he says, "it's the doctor here".

Now I've never been called by a doctor in my life, never mind at home and I don't know about you, but having his first word be "Don't worry" immediately scared the living hell out of me!

"Hello" says I, "What can I do for you?"

"Now I don't want you to worry, its nothing to worry about.  We have your BG results and they are a bit high so I thought I should call and tell you."

"Oh, how high?"

"Well, a bit higher than we would like really," pause, "so is your cholesterol and liver function and we'd like to check you kidneys"

SHIT!

"OooooKaaay - so exactly what are the results?"

"Well, your fasting BG is 17.6...."

I kind of stopped listening at that point, having been on Google for the last few days looking into what might be causing my symptoms and having a check list of a few really nasty options, a really high BG was not what I wanted to hear!

I was then asked to make an appointment for the next Monday to see someone at the surgery to go through the results, told to "stop eating anything with sugar in it" and "not to worry".

Monday 23rd January.  Another trip to the GP.  Another new face, and before I had even sat down, before even we had made eye contact, I was told I was overweight and needed to exercise, that I was a type 2 diabetic and needed metformin! Now, agreed, I could do with losing a few pounds, but overweight enough to become a T2?  My Body Mass Index was 26, I was 83.5kg, stocky sure, but WHAT!  I needed to "lose weight & exercise"!!

I was incredulous.  Here was someone who wouldn't be able to run down-hill for a bus telling me to lose weight.  Me!  Up until the last few months I had been training for a half marathon, running an 8 minute 30 second mile over 6 miles - bloody cheek!

Suffice to say I had a few questions, having spent the entire weekend researching diabetes - thank you the Diabetic Online Community (#doc)!

I asked for the basis of the diagnosis and the evidence to support it.  I asked for the tests and the data that discounted any other possibilities.  I asked for a copy of all the tests done to date and a full explanation of all of the results.  I wrote everything down in a notepad I had taken with me.  I asked for another opinion as I fundamentally disagreed with the diagnosis and treatment being offered me.  

I asked to see a specialist.

I was told that I could see a specialist in "a few weeks time" as the earliest slot on the system was well into March.  So I asked "does this practise have sufficient insurance to cover the unlikely event of me waking up in ER having been rushed in with Diabetic Ketoacidosis?" That got a response!

I was then give a blood glucose meter, told "not to go mad with it - there's no need to test all the time, a couple of times a day, and if the reading goes above 20, call us"

OK then - thanks!

So, home, open the meter, discover that there are only 10 test strips in the sample bottle and by the time you've figured out how to use the bloody thing you have 2 test strips left!  Back to town to the nearest chemist to see if they sell the test strips you want - they do!  How much!! Holy crap!!  Buy a couple of boxes and home again.

Lets see what happens!

Next instalment - First (Last) Supper, First Real Test & NHS Direct.

Begin at the Beginning

"Begin at the beginning and go on the the end: then stop" 

Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll

2011 - a great year, good weather, great holidays, excellent clients, loads to do and even more to look forward to!

2011 a year of training for a half marathon in spring 2012, a full marathon by the end of 2012, and the Etap du Tour for 2013.

Training runs and rides were going great, feeling fitter, stronger, faster.  Then, insidiously, I didn't.  

Legs felt heavy and unresponsive, despite the pace being high, and my general energy levels were dropping. It wasn't until a month had passed without going for a run or ride that I even noticed I'd stopped.  By then, however, I justified it as being too busy with work and having "no time"!

Without really noticing I was also a lot more tired of an evening, less rested of a morning and generally slightly 'duller'.

Whoo hoo!  November 2011, 44th birthday! Didn't want a party, didn't want to go out. Didn't really want to do anything.  For some reason I was also, for the first time in my life, putting sugar (!) into tea and coffee..... November rolled into December and by now my thirst was not slacked by even a litre of water, no I was on three of four litres of water a day, a litre over night and consuming litre bottles of lucozade and two litre cartons of fresh orange juice in between!  A mars bar, packet of crisps and 75cl of lucozade on the way to work, same on the way home, scoffing packets of crisps like they were going out of fashion and weeing for England! 

Oddly, none of this struck me as unusual.

Along came Christmas, even less enthusiasm for doing anything, massive, constant headache; "loose stools", constant stomach ache and boy, oh boy, talk about a sense of humour failure!  There were some very dark thoughts running through my head over that month, increasingly dark.

Or maybe that was the blurry vision that seemed to have crept up on me?

"I wonder if I've been changed in the night?

Let me think. Was I the same when I got up this morning?

I almost think I remember feeling a little different."

December 28th 2011 and I decided that perhaps some exercise would help.  Went out for a gentle 2 mile run. It seemed to take forever, but actually, the pace was OK.  

The three days it took me to recover weren't.  I could hardly walk the next day, felt sick as a dog and utterly fatigued.  My wife wanted to know why my breath smelt of booze the next morning, odd as I hadn't drunk any alcohol the night before.  Three days feeling sick and just drinking water constantly.

By now the headache, night sweats, loose stools and stomach ache had even me convinced that I should go and see the doctor, so on January the 16th I duly went to see my GP.

Mmmmmm sugar in your urine, come back and let us take some blood. Was told to stop eating anything sweet and heard the word "diabetes" for the first time.

Thank you google and the diabetic online community!

26th Jan 2012 and I was on insulin.